Senate Dems blast Boehner over vote

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) slammed House Republicans Friday after lawmakers failed to pass a short-term bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which runs out of money at midnight. 

“The Republican Congress has shown that it simply cannot govern. Two months into the Republican Congress, we are already staring a Homeland Security shutdown square in the face, even as terrorists around the world threaten to strike America,” the Nevada Democrat said in a statement after the House vote. 

The bill failed 203-224. More than 50 Republicans voted against the legislation, which would have funded the department through March 19. 

Reid wasn’t alone in his criticism.

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) suggested that the failure to pass the DHS bill created a bleak outlook for how House lawmakers would handle larger budget debates expected this year. 

{mosads}“The DHS funding fight is the first test of the new Republican Congress, and so far they’re failing,” the New York Democrat said in a statement. “If the Republicans can’t even fund something as simple as Homeland Security, we shudder to think what will happen when it’s time to fund the whole government or raise the debt ceiling.”

Schumer and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said the failed vote left Boehner with only one option: pass a “clean” bill to fully fund the department through September. The Senate passed similar legislation Friday morning. 

“Speaker Boehner is out of cards to play here — he must put the clean, Senate-passed bill on the floor now or risk a homeland security shutdown,” Durbin said in a statement. 

But what the next step is for funding the department, or if a partial shutdown would be avoided, wasn’t immediately clear. The Senate recessed Friday afternoon waiting for the short-term funding bill to be taken up in the House. Senators were expected to pass the legislation, if it had passed the House. 

Schumer, as well as Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), spoke to reporters ahead of the House vote on Friday. Though they all criticized House Republicans for taking up the stopgap legislation, they also said they would “reluctantly” support it in the Senate. 

“We’d much prefer they pass full funding,” Schumer said. “Obviously, we’re not going to shut down the government. … We’ll support it, but very reluctantly.”  

Updated at 6:31 p.m.